New York, NY (May 14, 2026) – Film at Lincoln Center and Cinecittà bring classic Italian cinema back to New York
From June 4 to 25, American audiences will be able to journey through over a century of Italian history via our cinema thanks to the “History, Italian Style” film series, organized by Film at Lincoln Center in collaboration with Cinecittà.
An ambitious project that offers not merely a film retrospective, but a true journey into Italian identity: from the Risorgimento to Fascism, from the Belle Époque to World War II, through 29 films that have chronicled, interpreted, and often challenged the history of our country.
The selection brings together true pillars of world cinema: *1900*, *The Leopard*, *Senso*, *The Comrades*, *Men Against*, and many others.
Films that have not only depicted Italy but have helped shape the very language of modern cinema. Works that have transformed cinema into collective memory, political reflection, and cultural consciousness.
The festival will open with Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1900, in its monumental 4K-restored version: an epic fresco on the birth of modern Italy, featuring an international cast that includes Robert De Niro, Gérard Depardieu, and Donald Sutherland, with music by Ennio Morricone.
Particularly interesting is the central theme chosen by the curators: Italian cinema as a tool for examining the past and understanding the present.
From Luchino Visconti to Roberto Rossellini, from the brothers Paolo Taviani and Vittorio Taviani to the contemporary filmmakers Pietro Marcello and Alice Rohrwacher, an Italy emerges that is portrayed not as a static image, but as a constant tension between memory, identity, social conflict, and cultural transformation.
The value of the festival also lies in its symbolic significance: bringing Italian cinema back to the center of New York’s cultural scene, in the place that has historically welcomed and celebrated some of our greatest filmmakers.
As Cinecittà President Antonio Saccone emphasized, Italian and American cinema are “blood brothers,” capable for decades of influencing one another, sharing visions, languages, and imaginaries.
On Friday, June 5, the director of the Italian Cultural Institute in New York, Claudio Pagliara, will host, at the Park Avenue location and in collaboration with Cinecittà, an in-depth panel discussion dedicated to History, Italian Style, featuring distinguished guests associated with the event. The discussion will focus on the central role of Italian cinema in shaping the country’s cultural identity and in the international dissemination of the national cinematic heritage.
At a time when the debate over European cultural identity has once again taken center stage, this film series demonstrates once more how Italian cinema remains one of the most powerful tools for exploring the complexity of our history, our contradictions, and our collective memory.
